


Pulled Together (By A Fragile Web)

by bethylated_spirits



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Coma, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Steve is there to catch Tony when he falls, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Vague Hints of past Steve/Tony
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-08-20
Packaged: 2020-09-19 02:57:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20323951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bethylated_spirits/pseuds/bethylated_spirits
Summary: Tony clutched at Steve's arms, his hands shaking desperately. There was still blood underneath his fingernails - Peter's blood. He felt his stomach lurch, and tried to force his mind away from the images that assaulted him every time he closed his eyes.When Peter is injured, Tony seeks comfort from a former team-mate and friend.Set after Civil War and SM: Homecoming.





	Pulled Together (By A Fragile Web)

"Tony?" Steve looked surprised at the late-night visitor. "What's going on?"

Tony opened his mouth, but all he managed to say was "Steve", before he collapsed into the other man's arms, sobbing. Steve automatically caught Tony, staring down at him in confusion and concern. He had seen Tony Stark confident, cocky and brash. He had seen him as a CEO, and a mechanic, and a superhero. He had fought beside him and, more recently, against him. He had seen him defeat aliens, build machines and babble in science-talk far beyond Steve's comprehension. But he had never seen Tony Stark cry.

Tony clutched at Steve's arms, his hands shaking desperately. There was still blood underneath his fingernails - Peter's blood. He felt his stomach lurch, and tried to force his mind away from the images that assaulted him every time he closed his eyes.

…………………

_Peter, blood leaking from beneath the hasty webbing he had shot onto his thigh, flinging himself back towards the Goblin with no regard for his own welfare._

_The Goblin, face hidden behind a wickedly grinning mask, laughing as he launched a pumpkin bomb at a balcony of people._

_Peter, diving after the projectile, flinging it away from the balcony._

_The explosion, occurring an instant after it had left Peter's hand, and Tony, flying desperately towards him, allowing himself to hope that Peter had gotten it far enough away from himself._

But it had been too close to him, and the blast knocked Spider-Man out of the air. And this time, he didn't come back up. Tony watched, as if in slow-motion, as the kid he had come to care about crashed into the pavement 20 feet below. He bellowed in pain and anger, blasting the Goblin straight off his stupid glider and soaring down to land at Peter's side. The kid's suit was scorched and burned away in places, patches of heavily blistered skin visible through holes in the fabric. The mask had been torn, and Tony could see one closed eye.

"Friday, call a med-evac", he instructed, voice only wobbling slightly. "Get Helen Cho and her team to meet us at the tower."

"Done", his AI replied, the electronic voice sounding calm and collected. Tony wanted to scream. Instead, he said "Read vitals. Give me a medical report."

Friday was silent for a moment, then recited: "Deep laceration to the right thigh, requiring stitches, 2nd degree burns along the right arm and chest, multiple contusions, concussion and possible further head injury. The suit's AI is offline, so I cannot give a complete analysis."

"Shit", Tony muttered, kneeling beside the fallen hero. "Come on kid, stay with me.”

The silence from his companion was deafening. Tony felt his chest tighten, breathing becoming more difficult.

"Come on, kid", he said again. He closed his eyes, focussing on his breathing. He couldn't afford to have an anxiety attack now.

"Friday, get me an ETA on that med-evac", he said, his voice a little strangled.

"ETA 2 minutes", the AI replied swiftly.

It had felt like an eternity to Tony. And another eternity as Peter was loaded into an ambulance, taken to the compound's medical wing, and wheeled away for stitches and scans and God knew what else. Tony stood, shaking, in the hallway for a long time before sinking down into a chair and preparing to wait. He couldn't say how long it had been when Dr Cho finally came out - several hours, he thought, although it could have been a week for how he felt. He stood automatically, swallowing the fear that rose inside him at the sight of the Doctor.

"We've cleaned and bandaged the burns - thankfully they're not bad enough to need any skin grafts." she told him. "The thigh wound was fairly deep, but we've stitched it and there shouldn't be any issues with that, especially with his advanced healing." Tony nodded, hanging on her words like a drowning man clinging to a buoy in the middle of the ocean. "He also had a couple of fractured ribs, and a transverse fracture of his right humerus, but they were simple breaks so I'm not overly worried about them. With his advanced healing rate, they should be fine within about 4 weeks." She hesitated, and Tony felt a surge of fear.

"What else?"

"I'm concerned about the head injury. He fell from a considerable height, and landed on bitumen. The suit would have provided a little protection, but not a lot. We've put him into a medically induced coma to help protect the brain and reduce any swelling."

Tony couldn't speak. A coma? Peter was in a coma? There were many occasions over the past year that Tony had regretted dragging a teenager into a world of villains and weaponry and danger, but Peter had proven himself time and time again, and Tony knew that even if he were to forbid Peter from patrolling, or to take away his suit, the kid would still keep doing what he was doing, because he considered it his duty to protect anyone he could. He had made that clear the first time they met – _'When you can do the things that I can, but you don't, and then the bad things happen... they happen because of you'_. Really, he took on a ridiculous amount of responsibility for someone whose peers were more occupied with school, getting drunk and having sex. But Tony trusted the kid, and he had made him the suit to help keep him safe. He had hoped never to find himself in this situation.

"Tony?" Helen was saying gently. She put a hand on his arm, and he abruptly shook it off, not wanting to feel her pity. "It's not as bad as it sounds, Tony", she said gently. "I can give you a couple of minutes with him, if you'd like?"

Tony swallowed, forcing himself to look at her.

"Does he... can he hear anything?" he asked her. She gave him a small, sad smile.

"I can't say for sure", she replied. "But we think that comatose patients are able to hear things around them, yes."

Tony nodded, then pushed past her and headed towards the room where he knew Peter would be kept. Part of him didn't want to see the young man, but he felt like he needed to... like he _owed_ it to Peter to prove he was there for him now, even though he had arrived too late to protect him when it mattered most.

He stopped in the doorway, his breath rushing from his lungs as he took in the sight. He had thought he was prepared for this. He was wrong. Peter lay motionless under the crisp white sheets, a nasal cannula snaking from his nostrils and his right arm encased in plaster. Gauze and bandages covered the myriad burns over his body, and various machines around the bed measured his heart rate, blood pressure and oxygen levels. He looked so small and so young - too young to be risking his life every night.

"Hey kiddo", Tony said softly, voice cracking. He waited, half expecting Peter to fill the silence with his usual stream of chatter. But he couldn't, of course.

"You..." Tony trailed off. What could he say to this ridiculously brave kid? He couldn't tell him what he desperately wanted to - that he would be okay, that he'd come out of this just fine - because he didn't know if it was the truth. And while Tony didn't have an issue with lying to most people, he had never lied to Peter. "I... I'm sorry, Pete", he said quietly. He sat there for a little longer, listening to the steady beeping of the heart rate monitor, then stood and quietly left the room.

He didn't realise where he was going, at first. He just knew that he had to get away – that if he was forced to spend any more time in close proximity to a teen who was lying comatose because of Tony's negligence, he would fall apart. And he couldn't blame Peter at all - the kid had just been trying to help, like he always did, and of course it was inevitable that at some point he would be injured in the line of duty. But Tony had never thought that he would end up in a _coma_.

He needed to move, to get away from this living nightmare. He briefly considered taking a car, but quickly dismissed the idea. Driving would be irresponsible, given how he was feeling right now. Flying an Iron Man suit wasn't exactly safe, either, but at least he would have FRIDAY to help him out.

Within five minutes of leaving Peter's room, Tony was soaring away from the compound. His eyes were dry and itchy, and he realised that he hadn't shed a tear since seeing Peter knocked from the sky. He pushed the repulsors faster, trying to leave his regret behind, but it was a constant shadow behind him which he could never outrun.

It was only after he had been flying for 20 minutes that he realised where he had subconsciously been heading the entire time.

_…………………………_

He'd kept tabs on Steve, of course. He half-convinced himself that it was in case the other man ever became a threat, in case Tony ever needed to bring him in. But he also knew that if that were his only concern, he would have told Ross where the super-soldier was hiding out months ago. Steve Rogers was still a wanted man, and his breaking the rest of the former Avengers out of the Raft had done nothing to endear him to the government. But Tony still held onto a shred of loyalty towards Rogers. A large part of him hated the super-soldier for what he had done, but underneath that anger was a deep respect and friendship, which couldn't quite be obliterated - no matter what he had said to Steve.

He knew that the man had spent some time in Wakanda (presumably with T'Challa, and wasn't _that_ an interesting turn of events?) before unobtrusively returning to America under a false name. It had taken some time for Tony to track him down, but thanks to the phone Steve had sent him, he'd managed to get a reading of the other man's location. Several months ago, the Captain had returned to his roots in Brooklyn – a risky move, Tony thought, but somehow he had not been found out yet, so apparently Steve was far better at going incognito than Tony had given him credit for. He’d likely been given pointers from Natasha during their time at SHIELD, although he had no way to check – she was off the radar as well and Tony had no clue as to where she might have gone.

Tony landed on the roof of Steve’s apartment building and stepped out of his suit, thankful for the growing darkness which helped obscure him from any curious or hostile eyes. The suit would be safe there until he was done – the configurations he had built into it ensured that nobody but him could pilot it, and FRIDAY would send an alert to his watch if anybody tried to.

He slipped down the fire escape, his feet moving as though automatically, carrying him to the man he had alternately admired, loathed, and trusted. He’d thought that any trust between them had been shattered when Steve’s shield – _damn, he couldn’t stop himself from thinking of it as Steve’s, even though it was currently locked away in HIS compound_ – had shattered his arc reactor, but apparently not. If it had been, he wouldn’t be here now, hoping to whatever beings were out there that the super-soldier could fix this. Realistically, he knew that Steve could do nothing to bring Peter out of his coma, or to ensure his recovery, but Steve seemed to have a solution to every problem and Tony could really do with a miracle right about now.

His feet had carried him to the door of Steve’s apartment, number 47, and he hesitated briefly before raising a hand and knocking sharply. He heard no footsteps to betray the man’s whereabouts, but the next moment Steven Grant Rogers was opening the door, surprise clear on his face at the sight of his former team-mate.

“Tony?” He asked, his eyebrows drawing together in concern. “What’s going on?”

For a few seconds Tony was silent, taking in the scruffy beard and the faint shadows beneath the captain’s steadfast blue eyes. Now he was here, he felt the tears that he had been unable to shed earlier rising like a tidal wave to the surface.

“Steve”, he choked out, pitching forward into the other man’s arms.

And Steve caught him, as Tony had known that he would. No matter what happened between them, Steve would always catch Tony when he fell.

…………………… 

Once the dam had been broken, Tony had sobbed in the other man’s arms for almost half an hour, unable to articulate any words other than “Peter” and “my fault” and “I’m sorry”. Steve had held him, uncertain and restrained at first, but eventually sighing and pulling Tony over to the couch, where the billionaire unashamedly left tear tracks all over the super-soldier’s shirt.

Eventually he was able to calm himself and sank, boneless, into the grey rayon couch. Steve rose and shortly came back with a steaming mug of coffee.

“Thanks”, Tony muttered, wrapping his hands around the mug. He took a sip. It was good – strong and bitter, just as he liked it.

Steve settled down onto the lounge chair opposite Tony and leaned forwards, elbows on knees and chin resting on his hands.

“So”, he said, remarkably composed given that the last time he had seen Tony they had almost killed each other. “What happened? How can I help?”

Tony shook his head, scratching his scalp tiredly. “It’s not a super-hero thing, Cap – well I guess it is, kind of. Peter got hurt, and I wasn’t there in time, and there’s nothing I can do to fix it, but I had to get out of there and you’re good at fixing shit so I ended up here, and –”

“Tony”, Steve interrupted. “Slow down, you’re not making sense. Who is Peter?”

The corners of his lips turned up in a grimace that looked as though it were trying to be a smile. “You’re gonna hate me.” He laughed bitterly. “More than you already do, anyway.”

“Tony…” Steve sighed, his soulful blue eyes seeming old and tired and hurt.

“Peter – Peter is Spider-Man”, Tony explained, blowing gently on his coffee. “He was doing his thing – just trying to protect people, because that’s what he does – and he got hurt. I couldn’t get to him fast enough, and now…”

“Is he gone?” Steve asked gently, his face a perfect picture of sympathy. Tony shook his head.

“He’s in a coma. Docs put him under, to… to help protect him, prevent any brain damage or anything.”

“Okay.” Steve exhaled heavily, reaching out to rest his hand on Tony’s. “Okay, Tony. So he’s still here. He’s still fighting. I understand it’s rough, but we all get hurt in this line of work. From what I know of him, he’s a brave man. And he’s strong. He’ll come out of this.”

Tony shook his head.

“That’s the thing, though”, he choked out. “He’s not… not a man.”

Steve’s eyebrows drew together. “What do you mean?”

Tony bit his lip, a few more tears slipping from bloodshot eyes.

“Tony…” Steve said warningly. Tony looked back up at him, his face filled with shame and sorrow.

“Peter is fifteen”, he whispered.

Steve stared at him for one long second, then shoved his chair back violently, pivoted and punched a hole in the wall. He whirled back around, breathing heavily, and glared at the other man.

“He’s _fifteen_?!” he exploded. “Tony, we fought in Germany almost a year ago. You brought a _fourteen_ _year old_ into battle with powerful, enhanced adults, then sent him out to fight crime by himself and you honestly didn’t expect that he’d end up getting hurt? _Christ_, Tony, I fought him! I thought he sounded young, but I never imagined you’d be reckless enough to bring a fourteen year old halfway across the world to fight for you. Did you even explain to him what he was fighting for? Did you let him make his own decision over whether he _wanted_ to fight for the Accords?”

Tony opened his mouth to reply, but Steve growled “_Shut up_” in a voice throbbing with anger, and the billionaire closed his mouth once more.

“I fought him. I _hit_ him. Tony, for God’s sake, you had me fight a _child_. What if I’d hurt him? How would you expect me to feel if I’d seriously hurt a kid?”

“Come on Cap, you were pulling your punches and we both know it”, Tony said tiredly.

“That’s _not the point_”, Steve hissed, grasping the front of Tony’s shirt and pulling him towards him. “And don’t call me Cap. That’s not who I am anymore.” He let go, and Tony dropped back onto the couch, speechless for once in his life. He blinked, then wiped his hands over his reddened eyes as though to clear them.

“I know it was… irresponsible”, he admitted eventually, his voice quiet. “I shouldn’t have brought the kid to Germany. But the rest of it… he was already doing the exact same thing, anyway. He told me the first time I met him that if you could do what he can and you _didn’t_, it was your fault when bad things happened, when people got hurt. He would have been out there, doing his Spider-Man thing, with or without my help. I gave him the suit, because at least that way he’d be better protected against whatever he decided to go up against. But either way, he’d be out there. Kid feels so much goddamn responsibility to _help_ everyone.” He huffed a laugh. “Remind you of anybody?”

Steve remained silent, watching Tony sadly through eyes which showed his true age.

“Why did you come to me?” he asked. “Why, after all this time? Because of the kid? I’m sorry Tony, but you know there’s nothing I can do to change what happened.”

Tony shook his head sadly, staring down into his lap. His custom-made Armani suit was wrinkled and stained with his tears. Sitting there, almost swallowed up by the couch, he didn’t look like a genius or a billionaire or a super-hero. He looked like a tired, defeated man who had seen and felt far too much sorrow for his years.

“I just…” he sighed heavily. “I just needed someone to be there. And even though I tried to hate your guts…” he looked up, brown eyes meeting blue. “I missed you, Steve.”

Steve’s lips twitched upwards slightly.

“Yeah”, he said softly. “I missed you too, Tony.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. I haven't written much lately because my mental health has been pretty bad, but I found this story I'd written a couple of years ago and fixed it up a bit. Please let me know what you thought!  
For anyone reading my Merlin fic 'Too Much To Bear', I'll try to get a new chapter up within the next few days.


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